Filed under: Boston Red Sox, Boston Bruins, Boston Celtics, New England Patriots
Last night was just an example of how fragile and capricious personal emotions can be during the months of a baseball season. Yesterday my psyche was on cloud nine, this morning it sat by the blue rubbermaid barrels waiting to be dragged off and slung onto a pile of other Red Sox fans’ disheartened mindsets. This will last for another few hours until Tom Caron and the NESN pregame show will arouse my Red Sox libido back to its rightful spot on a small dip in between the twin peaks of hopeful inspiration and dreaded fear.
I thought about the nature of my relationship with baseball, in light of yesterdays 7-3 loss to the Yankees, over my Rice Crispies this morning. My key realization, however obvious, is that baseball is indeed a game of averages. Not just numbers on a piece of paper, but emotional averages as well. As with any competitive league, there is essentially only one team, and their fans, who are left happy, satisfied, and fulfilled at the conclusion of any given season. However, I believe it to be how happy your team has made you on average, that is the ultimate test of a successful season, week, or month in the game of baseball. There is certainly the relevance of how much you enjoyed watching your team play. As well as the lesser details of how much your team causes you to invest your time, how hopeful you are before a given contest or season, and how much you believe they could win a title. But those are less essential than an over-simplified summary of just how happy your team actually made you.
You could rank your team on a .1000 percentage scale as to how happy they made you if you would prefer to stay loyal to the Bill James school of baseball numbers. I am sure you could create a mathematical formula as well that would include such numerical variables as how many hours you spent watching, thinking, or talking about your team; how many souvenir items you purchased within the last year; and how much you would be willing to pay for a playoff ticket. You could also throw in the team’s record as well.
As residents of a city that has enjoyed an abundance of championship trophies in the past few years, it might be a little more difficult to fully embrace this concept. After the Patriots’ streak of dominance, its almost hard to comprehend that anything but a championship could still be considered a good season. But if you really try to empathize with an average fan from an average franchise(and remind yourself you are a Celtics and Bruins fan too), its less difficult than you think. For example, I am sure Buffalo Bills fans of the ‘90s were pretty happy with their teams during the seasons. And if you don’t think Philly fans were happy just to have gotten to the Superbowl, well, then you need to talk with a member of the Department of Public Works. I am sure there are also a few(perhaps very few) Tampa Bay fans who actually enjoy watching Carl Crawford, Rocco Baldelli, and Scott Kazmir play on a daily basis, despite their abysmal record. And likewise a group of Yankee fans who can’t possibly enjoy watching their team play.
Baseball is the ultimate example of how this concept is important. On any given day their could be a slew of fans around the country happy with how their team played that day, regardless of whether they lived in St. Louis, Pittsburg, Chicago, or Kansas City. However, it is exactly the average feeling that is most important. Just as any big league slugger is not judged on any single game performance, but rather his average over a particular span of time. That time period could range from a week, to a season, to a decade, to a history of the franchise. For me and the Red Sox right now, it’s this season, with the occasional streak thrown in as well. And despite last nights hurtful loss, I’m pretty happy. Cautious, intrigued, anxious, and excited, and sometimes frustrated as well, but pretty happy nevertheless.
The most efficient way to fully evaluate your team based on this philosophy, would be to judge them at the end of the season, but prior to playoffs. This is a lot like giving a grade before the final exam, but it would put things in perspective a little more. As a fan, you might be more appreciative if you took as second to think about how your team made you feel during the duration of the season. No we’re not going to hold hands, take deep breaths, and really open up to the lesbian hippy moderator sitting Indian style across the circle, nodding her head like she really cares. But maybe you can crack a beer and appreciate(or scorn) how happy your team made you that season, before the ultimate disappointment of them not winning a championship.
As this strategy exists on averages, it is appropriate especially for baseball. As it transcends numbers, it can be universally applicable. As a baseball fan, it can be emotionally exhausting riding the highs and lows of a 162 game season. And many of us are not quite seasoned vets at it. Its tough to balance the appropriate detachment with the necessary passion of being a dedicated fan. So at any given time during the duration of a season, you can stop and think about the overall sensation of rooting for you team. If you’re a die-hard Pirates fan, you might not want to do this around razor blades, thick rope, or a medicine cabinet filled with old half-full prescription bottles. Or maybe you don’t want to think about it at all. But for the average Red Sox fan, it might be imperative for your sanity to think about the slightly bigger picture every now and again.
Or maybe you could just listen to what your Rice Crispies have to say.
theaveragefan@bostonprosports.com
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